Memory reconsolidation and the crisis of mechanism in psychotherapy

Ecker, Bruce; Vaz, Alexandre

doi:10.1016/j.newideapsych.2022.100945

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 76 publications

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“…As Ecker (2015) suggests, emotions felt by the participant during a session were used as cues for successful EM reactivation. Other than being a cue to confirm EM reactivation, VDR also seemed to stimulate emotional arousal for many participants (P6–S7).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Controversy remains about the specific role of emotion in the reconsolidation process. Ecker (2015) states that regarding EM reconsolidation in psychotherapy, emotional arousal serves as “a key marker of adequate reactivation” (p. 135). However, Lane et al (2015) propose that it holds a more important role in this process, capitalizing on the evidence that emotional arousal is a predictor of psychotherapeutic success and on the assumption that reconsolidation theory explains the neurobiological mechanisms of enduring change.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Using visual dream reports in art therapy to reconsolidate emotional memories.

Boudrias

2024

Dreaming

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A critical aim of psychotherapy is to modify the implicit emotional memories (EMs) that drive the unwanted behavior of clients. Empirical work from neuroscience and psychology suggests that, according to the reconsolidation theory, a memory becomes labile and susceptible to modification when it is reactivated and confronted with a prediction error (PE; i.e., an experience contradicting the memory). This action research aims to fill the gap between reconsolidation theory and psychotherapy practice. Specifically, it explores how EMs may be updated through reconsolidation by creating in-session visual dream reports (VDRs; e.g., dreamer's drawing, sculpture) in addition to writing a home dream journal. Eight women each attended eight art therapy sessions (including pretreatment and posttreatment sessions), where the therapist assisted them in identifying and updating EMs using their own VDRs. After each session, a table was filled with the identified EMs (i.e., predictions) and PEs that were processed. Data were reviewed to highlight the contribution of VDRs and the related emotions. Results suggest that both the written dream report and the VDR can contribute to different steps of the memory reconsolidation process. Affect change acted as an interoceptive PE, and the surprise reaction elicited through the creative process was used as a key marker of PE processing. Written dream report and VDR also contributed to verify the reconsolidation success. This research enlarges the variety of ways to conduct and verify EM reconsolidation in psychotherapy.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using visual dream reports in art therapy to reconsolidate emotional memories.

Boudrias

2024

Dreaming

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“…Now we proceed further to examine the range of variations in how that general form can be carried out, producing significantly different types and degrees of enduring change. On this point, Ecker and Vaz (2022, p. 4) have explained:Thus, by itself the term “memory reconsolidation” denotes not a particular type or degree of change, but rather the fundamental mechanism that destabilizes and then restabilizes (deconsolidates and then reconsolidates) the encoding of a target learning. That deconsolidation/reconsolidation process allows a target learning to be re-encoded and updated but does not in itself cause a target learning to be changed.…”

Section: The Core Change Universe: Memory Change Via Mrmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Most of the 13 cases contain long-term confirmation of ongoing symptom cessation and schema nullification without relapse, which is the strongest marker of unlearning via MR, but a few lack such follow-up verification. Ecker and Vaz (2022) have described the design of a planned study for carrying out that same type of detection in a methodologically sound manner, in order to put the demonstration on solid ground empirically. The hypothesis of this planned study was first defined by Ecker et al (2012): Whenever any therapy client begins to report the unambiguous markers of transformational change, that always is the prompt result of the unlearning process of MR having been fulfilled just previously, whether knowingly or unknowingly.…”

Section: The Core Change Universe: Memory Change Via Mrmentioning

confidence: 99%

A proposal for the unification of psychotherapeutic action understood as memory modification processes.

Ecker

2024

Journal of Psychotherapy Integration

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A person’s “memory” is the stored form of all types of acquired personal knowledge, including both knowledge of personal experiences (episodic memory) and knowledge of patterns perceived in the world (semantic memory), such as the knowledge that staying safe around one’s rage-prone, alcoholic parent urgently requires never expressing any views or feelings of one’s own. This article explores the possibility of (a) understanding most, if not all, psychotherapeutic action as a reconfiguration of knowledge held in memory and (b) identifying each of the distinct, fundamentally different endogenous mechanisms, or types of processes, that can modify memory therapeutically. In this way, a potential means of unifying psychotherapy emerges, enabling us to identify how any particular therapeutic process influences symptom production through its memory modification effects. Memory neuroscience has identified mechanisms of memory modification sufficiently for the proposed explorations to be pursued fruitfully at this point. The resulting unification scheme consists of two qualitatively different, main modes of memory modification, each with submodes. This scheme can account for the full range of therapeutic outcomes, from partial, unstable, relapse-prone symptom reduction to transformational change, defined here as the enduring cessation of a symptom and its underlying theme of emotional distress. Case vignettes illustrate the fundamental modes and some submodes of therapeutic memory modification. Viewed through this unification framework, diverse therapy systems no longer seem to belong to different worlds. Rather, their distinctive techniques and methodologies become a rich array of options for tailoring memory modification and therapeutic change uniquely for each person.

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“…As both frameworks also require that the interventionpharmacological or psychotherapeuticis followed by the new learning of a preferred behaviour different from the maladaptive one, i.e., counteractive learning. Unfortunately, this process creates a secondary belief (new behaviour) that competes with the existing maladaptive one, with the risk of relapse and/or a limited degree of symptom relief (Ecker & Vaz, 2022). As noted by different authors (Langkaas et al, 2018;Ecker & Vaz, 2022) mild, partial, incremental change has been the typical outcome in psychiatry and psychotherapy, both in general and in the treatment of AN (Zeeck et al, 2018).…”

Section: Implications For Treatment and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%